The Ashes series is now in full swing and with the Irish Cricket team throwing another ‘googly’ to qualify for a third consecutive Cricket World Cup, it’s high season for cricket bandwagoners. Break out the Pimms.
Now the chances are you’re probably more at ease with the idea of afternoon tea, and infinitely more comfortable with the diversion of drinking on the steps of the Pavilion in Trinity College than you are at taking to the crease and hitting one for six. But for anyone wondering why Ireland never quite joined other British colonies – the foremost countries in cricket wizardry – here’s a brief tour through the ‘innings’ and ‘outings’ of Irish cricket’s days of yore.
You could say that the year 2007 marked Ireland’s cricketing revival. It may have been our first ever appearance at The ICC Cricket World Cup; a flirtation on the international stage, but by no means was it the country’s earliest dalliance into the world of LBWs, wickets and pace bowlers. That came in 1792.
The first recorded cricket game in Ireland took place on a cabbage patch lawn in the Phoenix Park. It was a match between the local army garrison and an All-Ireland selection, made up of mostly government elites, who were in no way a representation of the island beyond the pale. In any case, the rank and file won by 94 runs and pocketed a tidy sum of 1,000 guineas in doing so. Interestingly enough, among the players taking to the field on that day was Arthur Wellesley, a man probably better known as the 1st Duke of Wellington and from the 200ft obelisk that bears his name at the centre of the Dublin park.
There began the gradual ascent of popularity that would result in cricket becoming one of the most-played sports in the country (at least for a brief period, anyway). By the 1850s, having received significant support from influential members of society, cricket clubs began to establish themselves in many parts of the country. The Dublin area remained the cricket hub however, as pavilions in Roebuck, Dun Laoghaire and the Vice-Regal lodge attracted aristocratic sportsmen and social climbers.
Interest in the game was firmly established in 1855 when the inaugural Irish international cricket team handed the swaggeringly named Gentlemen of England a hammering, beating them by 107 runs. However, the brief and mannerly fling with the sport was not to last; the reason being cricket’s close ties to Britain and the subsequent political complexities that came with that association.
The outbreak of the Land Wars and the nationalist upheaval drastically reduced the sport’s popularity and many would distance themselves from the ‘foreign’ game. In a strange way it was actually Charles Stewart Parnell’s nationalist movement that began Irish cricket’s demise, after it had been his father, John Henry Parnell, who had been such an important patron of the sport in its early days. This, coupled with the ban put in place by the GAA, which meant that no person could play both cricket and native Irish sports like Gaelic football or hurling, reduced the game to being played in small pockets of the nation.
While matches played on home soil against the test nations of the West Indies and South Africa in the early 20th Century did keep the game in the public consciousness, Ireland’s position as the problem colony meant that, by proxy, cricket never managed to sustain a wide audience. Maybe a few victories in the 2015 World Cup and a jump-start of the cricket bandwagon might change all that.
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Phoenix C.C. Dublin
Established in 1830 and situated in Dublin’s Phoenix Park, the club is the oldest and one of the most successful cricket institutions in Ireland.
Batmen
This cricket documentary is an attempt to bring Irish cricket out from behind the hedgerows and beyond the picket fence enclosures of cricket clubs to a wider audience. It charts the story of Ireland’s little known connection with cricket, from its earliest origins; taking in the heady days of the 19th Century, up to the period when the national team began to forge a reputation on the world stage as cricket giant killers.
The Duckworth Lewis Method
The D/L Method is not just a mathematical formulation to reset targets during rain affected one-day cricket matches. The name has also been hijacked, quite fittingly may I add, by cricket concept duo Neil Hannon and Thomas Walsh. Check out the band’s Ivor Novello nominated debut album which features the brilliant Jiggery Pokery or their latest dabble in the silly world of cricket, Sticky Wickets.
